ADAPTING TO CLIMATE CHANGE ON THE OREGON COAST A CITIZEN’S GUIDE A PROJECT OF THE Oregon Shores Conservation Coalition A Citizen’s Guide to Climate Change on the Oregon Coast March 2015 Copyright © 2015 by Oregon Shores Conservation Coalition LINKS TO ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: This Citizen’s Guide is intended to serve as an introduction to the vast amount of information available on topics related to climate change effects on the Oregon coast, as well as a sourcebook for citizens interested in helping their communities to begin the long process of adapting to these effects. In publishing the Guide, the Oregon Shores Conservation Coalition anticipates that most readers will access and read it online with Internet access or in an electronic format, such as a PDF, which will enable easy access to additional information. The Guide has two parts: Part One, A Primer, presents an overview of the topics pertaining to adapting to climate change on the Oregon coast. The Primer contains numerous embedded hyperlinks to enable readers to click directly to external websites or online PDF documents for additional information. Part Two, Scientific and Policy Considerations, is a set of papers written by Oregon experts in science, law, and policy. These papers, commissioned by Oregon Shores for this project in 2012, also contain references to further information. Although readers of a paper version of the Guide will be unable to directly link to external documents, a list of those external web-based sources at the end of Part One will enable the reader to enter those Internet addresses directly via a keyboard at their convenience. NOTE: Need a printed paper copy of the Guide? Download all or part of it. If interested in distributing a number of print version more widely, please contact Oregon Shores, P.O. Box 33, Seal Rock, OR 97376; (503) 754-9303; [email protected]. Adapting to Climate Change on the Oregon Coast A Citizen’s Guide Table of Contents OVERVIEW PART ONE A PRIMER Robert J. Bailey Climate, Change, and the Oregon Coast 1 Climate Science and Predicting Climate Change 2 How the Oregon Coast is Likely to be Affected 3 Responding to Climate Change 10 Links to Information Sources Cited in Text 26 PART TWO SCIENTIFIC AND POLICY CONSIDERATIONS Science: Sea Level Rise and Ocean Acidification, Allen M. Solomon ................................................................ 26 Waves and Water Levels, Peter Ruggiero ........................................................................................... 30 Impacts of Predicted Global Sea Rise on Oregon Beaches, Curt Peterson .......................................... 36 Oregon’s Estuaries and Climate Change, Corrina Chase ..................................................................... 40 Impacts of Predicted Global Sea Level Rise on Oregon Tidelands, Curt Peterson ............................... 45 State and Federal Laws and Policies: Social Vulnerability and Climate Change, Carrie Richter ..................................................................... 48 Tsunami Law in Oregon, Alex Wheatley ............................................................................................. 51 The Oregon Beach Bill, Steven Bender ................................................................................................ 53 Accretion, Reliction, and Avulsion – Oregon Common Law, Janet Neuman ....................................... 55 Permits for Structures on Oregon Beaches, William Kabeiseman ..................................................... 58 Coastal Shorelands and Climate Change, Steve Schell ........................................................................ 61 Transfer of Development Rights, Carrie Richter ................................................................................ 65 Oregon Global Warming Commission, Alex Wheatley ........................................................................ 69 Public Trust Doctrine in Oregon, Alex Wheatley ................................................................................. 71 Constitutional Limitations, Edward Sullivan ....................................................................................... 74 Federal Emergency Management Agency Activities on the Oregon Coast, Janet Neuman ................ 77 Federal Coastal Zone Management, Janet Neuman ........................................................................... 82 Case Studies and Tools: Tools for Coastal Communities and Local Governments, Courtney Johnson ..................................... 86 Climate Change Adaptation Efforts: A Review, Paris Edwards .......................................................... 90 Overview: regon’s beautiful, dynamic coast and coastal communities are vulnerable to the effects of O Earth’s rapidly changing climate. In fact, Oregon’s coast and communities are already feeling the effects of such climate change, perhaps most notably through serious negative impact on the shellfish industry from ocean acidification. While neither the rate of change nor severity of future effects can be known precisely, scientists are already measuring how the climate affects many of the natural physical and ecological settings and geologic processes on the Oregon coast and are discovering trends that offer clues to likely future impacts. The effects of climate change are important matters. Coastal communities have considerable private and public development and infrastructure built over the years on a presumption of a somewhat stable set of conditions. Unfortunately, those conditions will change significantly during the coming decades. Responding to these likely changes is a complex task partly because not all coastal locations will be affected equally. Impacts will depend on the particular geography and development in an area and the specific ways that sea level rise, flooding, erosion, acidification and other effects will impact that specific location. It is essential that the citizens of each community work together and with relevant government agencies and non-governmental organizations to assess their specific vulnerabilities, plan how to best to adapt to climate-driven change, and increase the community’s overall resilience. Oregon has the legal, policy, and planning tools to help coastal communities address climate change. Scientists are learning how the climate affects the coastal environment and are providing crucial information to aid citizens and communities in planning for on-coming climate effects. Local governments such as Tillamook County have begun to address ocean erosion hazards at the community scale, which will help point the way for other communities to address effects from climate change. Projects to remove dikes and levees to restore estuarine habitats offer important lessons of how restoration can help respond to and perhaps mitigate effects of climate change, enhancing natural, low-cost flood control and improving overall ecosystem functioning and productivity. And Oregon has been a leader in using new digital information technologies to enable local governments, watershed councils, and citizens to find and use mapped information to assess vulnerability and develop appropriate, effective solutions. The Oregon Shores Conservation Coalition, supported by the Spirit Mountain Community Fund, the Meyer Memorial Trust, and the Lamb-Baldwin Foundation offers this Citizen’s Guide to coastal climate change to help citizens understand the key issues, so that they can effectively participate in planning for these oncoming changes on the Oregon coast. Adapting to Climate Change on the Oregon Coast PART ONE: A PRIMER Climate, Change and the Oregon Coast regon’s coast is a region in flux even as it seems to stay the same. Ocean tides, driven by O the sun and moon, regularly ebb and flow in estuaries and on the ocean shore about every six hours; highest tides occur in winter and early spring while lowest low tides come in summer. Winter storms may last only a day or two but they flood estuaries, move vast quantities of sand along the ocean shore, and erode coastal bluffs. Comparison of old photographs with present conditions shows that beach conditions have changed and that bluffs behind ocean beaches have eroded over time. Scientific study of tide gauge data reveals the gradual geologic uplift of the coastal landscape, while an ongoing series of infrequent but large earthquakes causes periodic lowering of some sections of coastline. Mud, sand, and other debris buried beneath estuarine marshlands give evidence of these catastrophic earthquakes and overwhelming tsunamis that reconfigure the entire coastline overnight. An excellent overview, written for the layman, of how the ocean and atmosphere affect the coast of the Pacific Northwest is The Pacific Northwest Coast: Living With the Shores in Oregon and Washington by Paul Komar, a now-retired professor of oceanography at Oregon State University. The coastal climate and related weather patterns have always been variable within typical patterns: summers are typically dry with strong northwest winds while fall and winter are often wet and blustery with storms from the southwest. El Nińo and its opposite, La Nińa—climate conditions generated by swings in atmospheric conditions in the western Pacific Ocean—affect atmospheric and ocean currents across the entire Pacific Ocean Basin and dramatically alter ocean temperature patterns and the direction of storm tracks across the Pacific Northwest. Still other climatic and oceanic cycles come and go over longer